How to Catch Common Misspellings in Writing

This morning my 9-year-old was working on editing some sentences where she was looking for errors and correcting them. I noticed she tended to overlook some of the more common errors, such as misspellings of it's/its, your/you're, two/to/too, there/their/they're, and whose/who's.

She knows how to use each of the words the proper way, but catching them in writing, especially writing that is not hers, is something completely different.

I wanted a way for her to remember to check for those common misspellings, so I came up with a little graphic and a saying to help her remember which words she should always double-check when writing or editing.

"It's your two there! Whose?"

The saying doesn't really flow off the tongue, but it's not terribly difficult to remember. And hopefully it will help her recall which words she should always pay special attention to when she's editing any writing at all.

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Comments

I just came across this today. Love it! Part of my job is to read the reports our missionaries send each month, and to glean things for our publications from them. That, of course, entails 'fixing' grammar/punctuation/spelling errors. Sure wish I could send this to a few as a gentle suggestion, but then for them, it's about the content, not the presentation, which is OK with me. I've also found in those writings, though, another constant misuse. A couple of them use "where" and "were" interchangeably, and one uses "we're" instead of "were." I don't know if you ever run into this or not. Thanks for the posting!!

P.E.

Bike riding & weight exercises

About the Author

Joy is the wife of Jeff and mom to three more J's — Jaden, Jerah, and Joely.

She and her husband have been homeschooling their children since 2005, when their children were 3, 6, and 8. Joy works from home as a graphic designer and spends what little free time she has with her nose buried in a good book.

Joy's motto for parenting, homeschooling, and even business is “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” And that's what FiveJs.com is all about — teaching our children to "fish."